In a 35 minute Bush bashing speech, Daschle blasted the Bush economy. Looking for an election year issue, Daschle was careful to bash only the Bush economy, while giving Democrats and Clinton a free pass. Daschle asked that we forget about the Iraq issue for a moment and ranted that we need "help here at home on economic policy as well. We haven't seen it to date." Daschle also showed dozens of charts, that conveniently all began in January 2001. He is exactly right about needing help on the economy, but he need look no further than the mirror to see who he can blame the slow recovery on.

[Metaphor Alert] Even if Daschle is correct, and the economy was a fast moving train during the Clinton administration, and it came to a horrible wreck when Bush took office, you'd think they'd have had the forsight to see that the bridge was washed out.

Truth be told, the Senate democrats have been spending uncontrollably, while refusing to even put the budget on the agenda, even though it passed the house months ago. Defense spending bills have been put on hold while Daschle has pushed through $200 Billion in pork laden farm subsidies. An expensive prescription drug give-away bill still seems higher on his agenda than the war on terror, or the budget. Also, don't forget that it was the Daschle Senate that took 5 months, from October 2001 to March 2002, to pass the Economic Stimulus Package.

Over the last 2 years, the doors to the US treasury have been wide open to pork barrel spending. The hapless Republicans, who are trying to keep a 'new tone' in Washington, were holding the door open for them. Over the past two years, Congressional spending has mushroomed out of control, during which Republicans have been taking the heat for 'evaporating the surplus' and 'raiding social security'. Daschle whined about Bush's spending of the social security surplus, even though every administration in the past 40 years has done so. You never heard anything about a "lock box" when Clinton was in the white house.

Even today, some Democrats want to raise taxes on the American public. I cannot understand how people think this will help the economy. Over the past year, Daschle has been a master at stalling economic recovery, so that the Democrats have an election year issue. Meanwhile, Republicans have been unwilling to defend themselves. While Daschle was attacking Republican policy, Trent Lott just stood there and took it. Lets hope that the American public see's the Democrat's roadblocks for what they are, and that the Republicans will finally have the guts to stand up for themselves and try to break those roadblocks.